Who is the “us”?

(1511-October 27, 1553)

Michael Servetus has the singular distinction of having been burned by the Catholics in effigy and by the Protestants in actuality.^[1]

The exact date of the birth of Michael Servetus is a mystery. The day he was born is unknown but there is a difference of opinion regarding the year of his birth. Phillip Schaff in his History of the Christian Church[2] favors the year 1509 as the year of his birth. Most of what we know about the early life of servitus is from his testimony during his two trials at Vienna and Geneva. Though that information contains contradictions, it seems most likely that he was born in 1511 at Tudela in Navarre, and that while in early infancy he came to Villanueva de Sijena, a small town about 60 miles northeast of Saragossa, in the northeastern part of Spain where the family residence, the casa de Revs, is still shown, the most pretentious house in the community.[3] Roland Bainton clarifies the discrepancies of the year

[1] Hunted Heretic, The Life and Death of Michael Servetus 1511-1553, By Roland H Bainton, Revised Edition. Published by Blackstone Editions, Providence, Rhode Island 02906 © 1953 by the Beacon Press Revised Edition © 2005 by Blackstone Editions reprinted 2011 with updated bibliography, p. 1.

[2] Philip Schaff and David Schley Schaff, History of the Christian Church, vol. 8 (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1910), 712.

[3] The Two Treatises of Servetus on the Trinity, by Micael Serveto, alias Reves, a Spaniard of Aragon. Published by Wipf and Stock Publishers, Oregon. Presented by Harvard Theological Studies XVI, p. ixx.